Bow Down To Your Leader
by Five Dollar Mixtape
Summary: Soundkit and Lilykit are close: even for littermates. For a writing challenge in SoulClan. Based off of me and my brother.
1. Chapter 1

Prompt: "I've been keeping my feelings locked up in my head, but now I can't help but let them out." I'm going to be basing this off of me and my brother, just so you know… but it isn't exactly our life story.

* * *

Two kits were laying in the nursery, close to their mother. The queen was a bicolor gray and light ginger she-cat with hazel eyes. Those hazel eyes were filled with adoration as she looked at her kits: one was a dark brown she-kit with lighter paws, chest, belly, tail tip, and ears, and the other was a much lighter brown tom. Neither of them had opened their eyes.

Another she-cat padded into the nursery: a dark brown she-cat with a ginger muzzle, paws, ears, and tail with hazel eyes. She looked at the kits, a purr rising in her throat. "Have you named them yet, Clearwater?" the warrior asked, sitting down in front of the two kits. Clearwater shook her head.

"I was thinking that I would want your input for them, they are your siblings after all." The younger she-cat looked surprised.

"Really?" Clearwater nodded.

"Go on, Echobreeze, what do you think?" Echobreeze took a closer look at the kits, before nodding to herself.

"Soundkit for the tom." Clearwater narrowed her eyes, pondering over the name for a few heartbeats.

"Soundkit… I like the sound of that," she meowed, laughing internally at her own pun. "I was thinking Lilykit for the she-kit."

"Soundkit and Lilykit," Echobreeze murmured. "They fit them."

* * *

"Move it, Lilykit!" the moon old kit let out a huff as she got shoved, before turning her head to glare at her littermate with ice blue eyes narrowed.

"What was that for?" she asked. Her brother turned to look at her, darker blue eyes narrowed back at her.

"You were in my way!"

"No I wasn't!"

"Uh huh!"

"Nuh uh!"

"You don't know what you're talking about, idiot!"

"Yeah I do, moron!"

Soundkit lashed his tail, launching himself at his sister. The two rolled together on the ground, blows landing easily on unguarded bodies. The fight was sloppy, claws weren't unsheathed (Clearwater was fine with how physical their fights got, as long as they didn't use their claws on each other), teeth barely clung onto where they made their mark without breaking the skin.

"Stop it, you two!" The two stopped in their movements, looking towards a cream colored queen with bright green eyes. Her belly was swollen with kits. Clearwater was sitting next to her, and was just letting out a purr.

"Paleleaf, just let them work it out," the older queen meowed, licking her paw.

"Clearwater, they were attacking each other!"

"Haven't you heard the phrase 'don't go to bed angry'?" the bicolor cat asked, drawing her paw over her ear leisurely. "They only get a bit sore from the fighting, and if it helps them work out their issues, then I let them."

"But they-"

"It's not like they won't be fighting each other when they start training," Clearwater cut her off. Paleleaf had no more arguments, and Soundkit and Lilykit continued fighting until they were too tired to.

Lilykit collapsed onto the ground, Soundkit winning the fight once again. Soundkit collapsed next to her, pressing their pelts together. Both kits were too tired to complain about it.

"And it's better than forcing them to take a nap," Lilykit heard her mother add to the other queen. She heard their mother pad over to them. "Come on you two, back to the Nursery." They both let out grumbles of complaint before stumbling to their paws, their paws dragging as they made their way to the Nursery.

* * *

Three apprentices padded up to the fighting kits. One was a cream she-cat with ginger paws and ears with golden eyes, another was a smoked brown she-cat with orange eyes, and the last was a tipped white she-cat with ice blue eyes. Lilykit and Soundkit were too concentrated on their fight to notice to them.

The dark brown kit crouched, before she leapt onto her littermate's back. Soundkit panicked, throwing her off of him. Lilykit landed on the ground with a huff.

"You okay?" the tipped white she-cat asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine!" Lilykit scrambled to her paws. "We were just fighting, Dawnpaw!"

"They're _always_ fighting," the smoked brown she-cat grumbled, her tail lashing.

"C'mon, Heartpaw," the cream and ginger she-cat meowed as Soundkit padded up to them. "You heard what Clearwater said about them."

"I was expecting 'have a heart', Sunpaw," Lilykit meowed. Soundkit rolled his eyes as Sunpaw let out a snort. All three of the apprentice's ears perked as their mentors called for them.

"Well, I guess we'll see you guys later," Dawnpaw meowed, padding off towards her mentor with her littermates following. As soon as the cats were out of eyesight, the kits didn't hesitate to continue their fight.

* * *

Lilykit wasn't sure when it happened, but some point after they reached the two moon milestone, Soundkit's and her's fights became less full of anger and more full of playfulness. They would easily launch themselves onto each other, sending them into a playful fight until they were exhausted, and would just lay there as Clearwater (and sometimes Echobreeze) groomed their fur back to perfection.

Now, the two were the closest friends that they had.

Especially now that Lilykit was crouched in the corner of camp in fear, shaking like a leaf. Soundkit was pressed up against her as another shriek left the Nursery. Paleleaf had asked for Clearwater to be in the Nursery with her when she was kitting, and since the Medicine Cat, Oaklight, didn't have an apprentice, Clearwater was helping.

"Soundkit?" Lilykit whimpered, looking up at her brother.

"Yeah?" Soundkit asked, turning his head to look at her.

"I'm never having kits." Soundkit let out a small purr as Lilykit rested her head on her paws. After a few heartbeats of silence, Soundkit spoke again.

"Who do you think will be our mentors?" Soundkit asked. "Hypothetically."

"Hypothetically, I'm going to go ask my amazing future telling skills." Lilykit stiffened as another pain-filled sound left the Nursery.

"You're the most sardonic cat I have ever met."

"You mean out of all the cats who will actually talk to kits who keep fighting all the time? Oh, wow, look at all of our choices."

"See what I mean?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about." Soundkit shook his head as one last yowl left the Nursery.

"Hey, do you hear that?" he asked, nudging his sister with his shoulder.

"What?" Lilykit asked.

"Kits," Soundkit purred. Lilykit perked her ears, and sure enough, she could just barely hear the sounds of kits mewling.

* * *

Soundkit and Lilykit quickly got close to Paleleaf's kits. One of them was a smoked brown tom with amber eyes, and the other was a light brown tom with green eyes. The queen had named the smoked brown tom Glarekit and the light brown tom Tinykit. Lilykit felt bad for Tinykit and his name, and Glarekit didn't fit his name at all.

She questioned Paleleaf's sanity and naming choices.

"Hey!" Lilykit turned her head to look at the kits, still struggling against Echobreeze's grooming. Glarekit skidded to a stop in front of her, and Tinykit stopped in front of Soundkit.

"Your ceremony's today!" Tinykit meowed happily.

"Is it?" Lilykit asked. "I wasn't sure."

"Most sardonic cat I've ever met," Soundkit chimed in.

"Are you excited?" Glarekit asked.

"I want to know who our mentors are," Soundkit cut in before Lilykit could respond. Finally, Echobreeze released Lilykit. Soon after, Soundkit was released by Clearwater.

"Alright, you two, go and wait by the Fallen Tree," Clearwater ordered. "Be patient and wait for Flamestar." Her two kits nodded before giving a quick goodbye to Glarekit and Tinykit, bounding off towards the Fallen Tree.

"I hope I get Froststream," Soundkit meowed as the two sat down.

"What's so special about her?" Lilykit asked, tilting her head.

"She's one of the best fighters in the Clan."

"Soundkit, I've never beaten you in a fight."

"You haven't been trained. If I don't get a good mentor, then you'll beat me, and how am I supposed to handle that?"

Lilykit just let out a huff, and looked up at the Fallen Tree. It felt simultaneously like just a few heartbeats and a season before the russet she-cat that was Flamestar appeared on top of the Fallen Tree.

She began without preamble. "Soundkit, step forward." Soundkit happily got to his paws and padded forward, stopping a few tail lengths in front of the Fallen Tree. "From this moment on and until you earn your warrior name, you shall be known as Soundpaw." Flamestar looked into the crowd. "Hillpath, I believe that you are ready for an apprentice. You had a great mentor in Nightpool. I expect you pass down all of the skill she taught you onto Soundpaw."

A shaded black tom padded into the middle of the ring of cats, his copper eyes shining as he touched noses with his new apprentice. The two slinked back into the crowd, but stayed at the front to watch Lilykit's ceremony.

"Lilykit, step forward." The she-cat took a deep breath before padding forward to stand where Soundpaw was before. "From this moment on and until you earn your warrior name, you shall be known as Lilypaw. Warmrain, I believe that you are ready for an apprentice. You had a great mentor in Dapplewing, and I expect you to pass down all of the skill she taught you onto Lilypaw."

Lilypaw turned her head to look at a calico she-cat with green eyes that was padding towards her. Warmrain dipped her head to make it easier for them to touch noses, and the two padded back into the crowd. Lilypaw settled down next to Soundpaw, and the two sent each other a small smile.

"Soundpaw! Lilypaw! Soundpaw! Lilypaw!"

* * *

Soon after Soundpaw and Lilypaw began their training, Lilypaw noticed something about herself: she couldn't help but hide her emotions. She used sarcasm, or Soundpaw would insist upon calling it, 'being sardonic' instead of showing how she felt, even with her brother.

Maybe she'd get better at it someday.

* * *

"Soundpaw!" Lilypaw complained, flicking her tail.

"I just said 'bow down to your leader'!"

"For the billionth time, and you're not our leader, and Flamestar doesn't make us bow to her!" she argued.

"You and your logic," Soundpaw grumbled playfully. Lilypaw leapt onto her brother, balancing herself on his back. Soundpaw turned over, crushing Lilypaw under his weight. Lilypaw slipped out from under him, landing a hit on his belly before he got back onto his paws. She turned around and cuffed his ears.

"Hey!" he laughed. "Bow down to your leader!"

"Stop saying that!" Lilypaw shot back as Soundpaw flashed out a paw.

Only one moon of training, and there was already a difference.

* * *

Lilypaw and Soundpaw bounded next to each other, easily keeping up with the other cats in their Clan. Lilypaw could see Sunpaw, Heartpaw, and Dawnpaw in front of them, along with Hillpath and Warmrain.

"How many apprentices do you think are in the other Clans?" Lilypaw asked.

"At least a few, hopefully," Soundpaw answered as they entered the Tree Round. They watched as the three older CloudClan apprentices padded towards a tree, where Lilypaw saw a few other apprentices sitting. Sunpaw turned to look at the two younger apprentices, gesturing with her tail for them to join her. The littermates didn't hesitate.

They easily scaled the tree, both sitting down on a branch just below Sunpaw and Heartpaw. Dawnpaw was sitting next to a dark brown and black tabby with copper eyes, and a shaded red tom was on a branch above them.

"Hi!" Sunpaw greeted happily.

"Who're these?" The shaded red tom asked, looking down at Soundpaw and Lilypaw.

"I'm Soundpaw."

"Lilypaw."

"I'm Blazepaw," the tom responded, happiness leaking into his tone.

"I'm Hauntedpaw," the black and dark brown tabby meowed in a soft voice.

"Nice to meet you guys," Soundpaw meowed, his ear flicking. Lilypaw nodded in agreement.

"So, how's training been for you guys?" Dawnpaw asked. "And why aren't Riverpaw and Thunderpaw here, Hauntedpaw?"

Hauntedpaw shrugged. "Froststar just didn't bring them," she meowed softly. "I think my training's going well."

Blazepaw nodded in agreement. "I'm doing pretty good, too! I just learned how to attack-"

"Are you really just going to tell us how your Clan fights?" Lilypaw interrupted. Soundpaw rolled his eyes.

"If you're wondering, yes, she's always like that," he meowed.

"Well, you two won't _stop_ fighting," Heartpaw meowed.

"We're going to be the best fighters in the Clan!" Soundpaw shot back. "Bow down to your leader!"

"If I catch something, just for you, would you stop saying that?" Lilypaw asked, turning her head to look at her brother.

Soundpaw considered it for a heartbeat. "Yes, yes I will."

* * *

"Bow down to your leader!" Soundpaw laughed, pinning his sister down.

"I gave you a water vole to stop you from saying that," Lilypaw meowed, kicking at his stomach and shoving her brother off of her.

"Oh, right."

Their mentors just shook their heads.

* * *

"Can you hear that, Lilypaw?" Soundpaw asked, stopping under the Willow Tree on their territory.

Lilypaw was quick to notice that CloudClan territory was on higher ground than all the others, making it colder. CloudClan cats pelts were also thicker than other cats, keeping them warmer in their colder climate.

"What should I be hearing?" Lilypaw asked.

"You can hear the wind blowing through the branches and leaves of the tree, and even on the grass," Soundpaw explained. "It's almost like a song."

Lilypaw perked her ears, listening to the sounds. Sure enough, the wind was blowing through the tree's branches and leaves, causing them to rustle and slide together. The grass was the same, but if the wind blew just right they could hear a whistle.

"Yeah, it is." she responded.

* * *

"This may be the last time you see me doing this," Soundpaw meowed.

"Doing what?" Lilypaw asked, narrowing her ice blue eyes.

"Practicing battle moves."

Many moons had passed in the two's training. In fact, they weren't far away from their final assessment. Warmrain had told her that she was proud of the cat that she had turned out to be, even though Lilypaw herself wasn't so sure. When was the last time that she let out an emotion that wasn't around Soundpaw? Never, she was pretty sure.

"Why? You're still better than me."

"Well, yeah, but there's this move that Hillpath showed me that I just can't get right."

Lilypath smiled. "You mean… _you_ can't get a move right?"

"Shut up," Soundpaw growled playfully, before crouching down onto the ground. He had his two hind legs lined up, and his left front leg a mouse length behind his right front leg. He pushed himself into the air, pushing himself around with his left front leg while the lower half of his body swung around. He quickly lost his balance and fell onto the ground with a 'thump'.

"Wow, how graceful."

* * *

"Sorry that you can't come with us," Soundpaw meowed. "But I guess that Flamestar just wanted me, Sunpaw, and Dawnpaw."

Lilypaw shrugged. "Well, at least Heartpaw's not going, either."

Soundpaw nudged her shoulder. "We're just going to the Moon Field. The most dangerous part is crossing the Thunderpath, and Flamestar knows how to do that."

* * *

 _I ask my warrior ancestors to look down upon this apprentice. They have learned the warrior code and have given up their life in service of their Clan. Let StarClan receive them as a warrior._

 _He will be known as Soundwind._

* * *

Lilypaw's first reaction was disbelief. The evidence was right in front of her, with Hillpath carrying his apprentice's body into camp and laying him in the center of the clearing.

"Soundpaw?" Echobreeze whispered from next to her.

Hillpath shook his head, his copper eyes filled with sadness. "Soundwind."

Lilypaw slowly padded forward, looking down at her brother. She barely noticed the tears falling from her eyes as she pressed her nose into her brother's fur.

* * *

The second day was worse. There was nothing to distract her from the crushing sadness that had taken over her mind, since Warmrain had insisted on her taking a day off. There was nothing she could do, except think _What if I had been there? Would he still be alive then?_

* * *

"I, Flamestar, Leader of CloudClan, call upon my warrior ancestors to look down upon this apprentice. She has trained hard to understand your noble code, and I commend them to you as a warrior in her turn." Flamestar turned her eyes back to the apprentice in front of her. "Lilypaw, do you promise to uphold the warrior code, to protect and defend this Clan, even at the cost of your life?"

"I do." Lilypaw's voice was quiet and laced with a type of permanent sadness.

"Then by the powers of StarClan, I give you your warrior name. Lilypaw, from this moment on you shall be known as Lilystream. StarClan honors your strength and endurance, and we welcome you as a full warrior of CloudClan."

Flamestar leapt down from the Fallen Tree and rested her muzzle on Lilystream's head, and the new warrior licked her leader's shoulder in return.

"Lilystream! Lilystream!"

* * *

Lilystream turned over, crushing the smaller cat under her weight. She felt the claws detach from her, getting back to her paws. She turned to look at the black cat with bright green eyes. She sniffed the air, recognizing the scent as a rouge.

"Get off of CloudClan territory," Lilystream snarled, half-heartedly slashing at the cat's ears. After all, Soundwind and her and fulfilled their goal of being one of the best fighters in the Clan.

Apparently, this cat was a good fighter, too. They rushed forward, her claws flashing in the moonlight. Lilystream jumped backwards, her jaws closing around the cat's paw. They let out a hiss of pain, lunging forward to scratch at her muzzle. She let go of their paw, ducking under the cat and twisted to claw at their belly.

The cat turned right after Lilystream escaped from under them. Their jaws latched around her throat, digging deep into the skin and letting her life blood flow.

* * *

Lilystream shook her head as she stood up, looking around. The fields were the same, the rouge was gone: the only difference was that her body was laying under the Willow Tree.

"Hey, Lilystream." The warrior stiffened at the voice, but didn't have the time to turn around before a cat leapt on her back, forcing her to the ground. She didn't feel any claws in her back, and she was filled with an overwhelming happiness. She had to admit, it was a good change from the sadness that had been haunting her.

"Bow down to your leader!"

" _Soundwind!"_

* * *

 _"You roll with a guy for so many years... you start to think he's always gonna be next to you. Like, when you're old, there'd be another rocking chair. And something happens. And you realize, that other rocking chair is gone, and... you know what I mean?"_


	2. Chapter 2

_"In some ways, writing books is like giving yourself eternal life, isn't it?" -Ania Ahlborn, Within These Walls_

* * *

I'm writing this before I decide to publish it, so it might never see the light of day for all I know, but I felt like it needed writing. I wanted to explain the actual reasons and inspirations behind the scenes in _Bow Down To Your Leader_ , and I'll be adding a scene that I intended to put into the original at the end. I just forgot to put it in.

* * *

Let's start with my naming choices. I based them all off of actual people's name's meaning. Have you ever noticed how religious name meanings are? Anyway, to the actual thought processes.

Let's start with my brother. He will be the only person who's name I'll be actually using, because his name has been on news reports already. Scott is a name from Scotland, that means Scott, so I couldn't really use anything for the name meanings. I chose 'Sound' because of his passion for music (guitar the instrument he played).

My name just means 'lily', and was by far the easiest.

My mother's name means 'pure' or 'clear'. I went with clear.

Scott and I have an older half sister: she's fifteen years older than me and thirteen years older than Scott. I had to google her name, but I only got info on it, then I clicked on a different form of her name that she said that she always wanted to be called and found out that it meant 'resurrection'. I thought 'Echo' would sum that up fairly well.

Glarekit and Tinykit are both based off of my former step brothers. Paleleaf is sort of based off of my former step mother (my father got divorced from her), but her name (which means 'oath of my God') doesn't really have anything to go off of for a warrior name so I just based it off of her blonde hair.

Glarekit's real name means 'victory of the people'. I googled what a group of cats what called, and found out that one of the terms for it was a glaring.

Tinykit's real name means 'little king'. I don't think I have to explain much for that.

Hillpath is based off of Scott's old guitar teacher from back in the day. When Scott started he was mostly self taught, but then he decided that he wanted to pick up a guitar teacher. His name means 'hill covered with broom' or 'from the beacon hill'.

Warmrain was my old flute teacher. I still play it, but I was also starting to pick up guitar under Scott's teachings. Her name means 'God has been gracious'. I found synonyms for 'gracious', then found out that 'nice' was a synonym, and just found a word that I thought kinda fit for it. I ended up with 'warm'.

My father is absent from this: I actually mostly live with him. But both me and Scott wanted to spend more time with my mom, since we only got to spend every other weekend with her (Scott actually spent about half a year living with her at one point). I thought that, for fiction purposes, I would like to have us spending more time with her.

* * *

Me and my brother spend the first few years of our lives _hating_ each other. I don't know why, but it's apparently a sibling-y thing to do. Farther on, though, our fights turned into less of actual fights and more games. I remember that right after I was introduced to Warriors I came up with a game where I was a cat and he was a dog, and we ended up fighting for some reason or another.

I never won against him.

Lately, I don't remember us fighting more than an argument over what we wanted to have for dinner.

* * *

Scott has repeatedly told me that I am the most sardonic person that he has ever met. I, myself, prefer to call it sarcasm. He also told me that I told a lot of puns, which I wasn't convinced about.

When I was younger, I was scared of everything. I don't really remember what would happen to calm me down, but I do remember that Scott was a lot more effective with helping me than my parents or sister was.

* * *

I actually decided to do this prompt because I had a therapist tell me before that I had a problem of locking up all of my feelings. She told me to picture my feelings like a beach ball: the more things I felt the bigger the ball got and sooner or later that ball would pop. Sometimes emotions would leak out, but most of it got locked up inside.

* * *

The actual phrase that Scott used was 'bow down to your president'. I payed him a dollar to stop saying that, but I also got a Sunkist out of that dollar. How I did that, I'm not sure. Does that count as a monopoly, probably.

* * *

Scott had a habit of coming into my room, grabbing my guitar (he said that it was fun to play), sitting down on the edge of my bed, and playing. Sometimes just himself would sing, other times it would just be me (most of the time), but some times both of us would.

Our favorite songs were the following:

American Pie- Don McLean

Paint It, Black- The Rolling Stones

A song his friend wrote called Home, or what we remembered of it, at least ( _Home is where the heart is, it never really changes, but you sure as hell will always come back~)_

Behind Blue Eyes- The Who

Bat Out Of Hell- Meat Loaf

Take The Money And Run- Steve Miller Band

Heard It in a Love Song- The Marshall Tucker Band

Mrs. Robinson- Simon & Garfunkel

Romeo and Juliet- Dire Straights

Jack and Diane- John Mellencamp

Bad Moon Rising- Credence Clearwater Revival

The General- Dispatch

Another Brick In The Wall- Pink Floyd

Used To Love Her- Guns N' Roses (this one went a little _too well_ with Heard It in a Love Song)

Psycho Killer- Talking Heads

Johnny B. Goode- Chuck Berry (the first song Scott learned)

Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard- Paul Simon

A Horse With No Name- America

We Didn't Start The Fire- Billy Joel

You Can Call Me Al- Paul Simon

Stairway to Heaven- Led Zepplin

Helplessly Hoping- Crosby, Stills, and Nash

Thunder Road- Bruce Springsteen (This was his favorite song, I believe)

Here Comes The Sun- The Beatles

Sympathy For The Devil- The Rolling Stones

Civil War- The Rolling Stones

...Wow, that is a long list of favorites.

* * *

The part where Soundpaw said "This may be the last time you see me doing this," was actually "this may be the last time you see me doing homework". It was some assignment about WWII, and we made fun of something about oil and pretended to not know who Hitler was.

Now, I'm convinced that we're all part of a story and the writer was just foreshadowing.

* * *

Scott was hit by and killed by a car on September 21st, 2016: just over a week ago for me. He was seventeen years old. His visitation is tomorrow (as of the time that I'm writting this), but I got to see him earlier. They put too much Botox in his lips. My mom gave him his ear buds, so that it looked like he was listening to music.

The first day isn't nearly as bad as what comes after: I guess that you're still in shock. The fact that Scott was really gone didn't set in until quite a few days later. He had had problems with the law before (just before he died, he had decided that he wanted to graduate from high school and he said that he "had friends his parole officer would be proud of"): at one point he had even been gone for over half a year, but I always went to go visit him on Saturdays when I was at my mom's house.

I, obviously, haven't died yet. I got the quote at the bottom from a Supernatural edit.

* * *

Lilypaw let out a yawn as she followed after Soundpaw, her tail tip flicking in annoyance. "What did you say we were doing?" she asked.

"Well, Lilypaw, I met a loner," Soundpaw explained, padding confidently through the territory and ignoring Lilypaw's reaction (which was stiffening and narrowing her ice-blue eyes). "And we're going to go meet him."

"Soundpaw!" Lilypaw hissed. "We can't just go _meet a loner_!"

"Why not?" he asked, looking back at her. "He's not going to hurt the Clan."

Lilypaw let out a sigh, deciding that it would be better to help her brother hide his secret meeting than let him mess up on hiding it from Hillpath and the other warriors. "What's his name?"

Soundpaw smiled at her. "Teddy."

"Teddy? What kind of name is Teddy?"

"Teddy is a great cat who's puns rival even yours."

"I don't make _that_ many puns."

" _Pun_ ishment," Soundpaw countered. "Oh deer."

Lilypaw flattened her ears. "Shut up."

* * *

 _"It is the secret of the world that all things subsist and do not die, but only retire a little from sight and afterwards return again. Nothing is dead; men feign themselves dead and endure mock funerals and mournful obituaries, and there they stand looking out the window, sound and well, in some strange new disguise." -Ania Ahlborn, Within These Walls_


End file.
